The Three Sisters

Talk, talk, talk. That is all that goes on in the Prozorovs' house, complains Masha, the frustrated middle sister of Chekhov's trio.

But amid the torrent of words expended on the sisters' mythologised return to Moscow, major events do occur in this play - including a fire and a duel.

Visiting director David Leveaux dispels the mood of lassitude that usually infuses this provincial home, and creates a hothouse atmosphere in which opinions are over-emphatic, and emotions boil.

The intensity is deepened by designer Mike Britton's red and plum interior, washed in amber light by Brian MacDevitt, as the ensemble cast move like animated figures on a pointillist canvas.

Sprawling on a chaise longue, or dancing with lugubrious ardour in front of her lover Vershinin, Masha (Derbhle Crotty) is captivatingly histrionic, with a wit that overshadows her two sisters, Olga (Justine Mitchell) and Irina (Emily Taaffe).

Like the spinning top that is spotlit in the opening act, they are burning up energy, gesturing wildly against futility.

Matched by comic timing that approaches farce, the febrile tone tends to overshadow emotion. The plight of the eldest sister Olga gets lost, while the main source of the sisters' disappointment, their gambling brother Andrey (Nick Lee), barely registers.

But amid some uneven performances, Darragh Kelly captures Chekhov's delicate balance of tragedy and absurdity: as Masha's schoolteacher husband, Kulygin, he is sensitive and brave rather than buffoonish, and the Latin phrase he quotes summarises what the others have tried to express throughout: "The false hopes that men entertain."